Religiously unaffiliated on the rise in the South and across the U.S

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In other news, the sky is blue and bears poop in the woods :yawn:
 
Son_of_Niall said:
Read more here: thestate.com/incoming/article27815056.html#storylink=cpy
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Christianity is in a dismal state; it’s shattered into thousands of competing churches and denominations. If I was a “None,” I would feel justified in being one. Why bother to be a Christian when they can’t even agree on what the religion truly teaches or stands for?

The Devil is grateful for false ecumenism and denominationalism. I say that, because as the Scriptures declares, God is not the author of confusion.
 
outremer said:
Christianity is in a dismal state; it’s shattered into thousands of competing churches and denominations. If I was a “None,” I would feel justified in being one. Why bother to be a Christian when they can’t even agree on what the religion truly teaches or stands for?

The Devil is grateful for false ecumenism and denominationalism. I say that, because as the Scriptures declares, God is not the author of confusion.
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Well, the idea is to sit down and actually put some thought into reality. I think a lot of folks who turn away from God don’t do it because they are sifting through a mountain of well-tuned philosophical, cosmological knowledge interested in the Truth, they do it for petty and selfish reasons—like to snub their parents for making them go to Sunday school, or because they want to have all kinds of sex and/or look cool and hip in front of people they want to impress.

The article does seem to credit for this pheonmena, and I can believe that. But the reality is a lot of information on-line (especially free information) is garbage.
 
Muslims number about 7 million in the U.S. The U.S. population is estimated at around 339 million people. Do the math, while it is small, it is not 1% and like vermin, they are growing.

In some European countries it is estimated that the Muslims will overtake the native populations in 25 years.

Muslims and their radical religious beliefs are responsible for most all the wars and civil unrest occurring in most of the world today.

Muslims are not a scapegoat, they are the problem. Seems like you and the Obama Regime have much in common - denial of the truth.
 
It’s more than that, but Islamic population trends are more of a concern in Europe for different reasons.

And it’s not a scapegoat, it’s an explanation.
 
outremer said:
Christianity is in a dismal state; it’s shattered into thousands of competing churches and denominations. If I was a “None,” I would feel justified in being one. Why bother to be a Christian when they can’t even agree on what the religion truly teaches or stands for?

The Devil is grateful for false ecumenism and denominationalism. I say that, because as the Scriptures declares, God is not the author of confusion.
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I agree. But the Catholic Church has to take responsibility for why this has occurred. The corruption in the Church brought on the Protestant Reformation which gave rise to the ability of anyone who disagreed with the Church to start their own church.

The corruption within the church continues today and why so many continue to leave the Church. The world-wide child abuse scandal and attempt at a coverup is one of the most recent and notable systematic abuses of the Church. It drove my mother from the Church.

One thing that would help is to give parishioners more control over their local church parishes. The priests yields too much operational control and can veto anything parishioners want. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

It was our money that was donated that went to pay the victims of abuse. Had we parishioners known about the abuse, it would have surely been stopped along with the transfers of offending priests.

When people don’t view themselves as being a part of the Church and more like a royal subject of the Church, they will start to leave.

One thing I do admire about many of the Protestant churches is what they do as a community. Dinners, fellowship, youth activities, Bible Study, active ministers who visit with the people, church councils that control the finances of their church and being able to get rid of a minister who is not liked by the congregation. In other words, it is the money of their church community and therefore they have a lot more control over how it is spent. Be nice if Catholic Churches did the same.

When you make people a part of the church, they take part in church.
 
There is a bit of a silver lining- it’s a decent silver lining for Protestants, not as big for Catholics. There are quite a few people who have left church behind, and many of them are even raising their kids without any churchgoing habits from the youngest possible age. However, when this happens, the rate of retention for the unaffiliated is not that good.

Among those who are raised unaffiliated, the rate of retention is less than 50%. Which is to say, only 46% of those raised unaffiliated are still unaffiliated as adults. Protestants and Catholics have much higher rates of retention- 68% of cradle Catholics are still Catholic, and 83% of cradle Catholics are some type of Christian who goes to church. 52% of those raised Protestant still belong to the specific type of Protestant church they were raised in, 80% are still some type of Protestant although much of that reflects a shift from Mainline to Evangelical, and exactly 83% of those raised Protestant are still some type of churchgoing Christian as an adult. An 83% churchgoing retention rate across the board is really quite good, especially compared to the 46% retention rate of those raised unaffiliated.

Now, with that being said, those raised Catholic and Protestant do wind up being unaffiliated with religion at rates of 14% and 13%, respectfully, and these rates are elevated significantly from where they’ve been in the past. But if this is to be what our future looks like, Protestants can look to some more comparative data that is fairly encouraging- 39% of those raised unaffiliated are now Protestant, and 22 of those percentage points go to Evangelicals, 13 to Mainline and 4 to historically black churches. Again, comparatively speaking and for the moment ignoring the relative size of the groups, I am very encouraged to see that 39% of those raised unaffiliated are becoming Protestants as adults. A loss rate of 13% is not quite what we want to see, but the percentage of those raised unaffiliated who become Protestant is three times greater. If these numbers hold up over time, the conversion numbers indicating who’s coming and going should be quite favorable as other factors stabilize a bit.

The relative percentages are not as good for Catholics, I’m afraid. The extent of your silver lining is a much higher rate of retention, 68% stay Catholic and 83% stay Christian whereas only 46% of those raised unaffiliated remain so. However, when you look at how many cradle Catholics become unaffiliated, that figure is 14%. By comparison, 6% of those raised unaffiliated are now Catholic. So basically, compared to cradle Catholics, those who are raised unaffiliated are not likely to be retained as such- but they also aren’t all that likely to become Catholic, those who do become affiliated tend to do so elsewhere, mostly as Protestants.

Sources. pewforum.org/2009/04/27/faith-in-flux2/ (chart at the bottom)
pewforum.org/2009/04/27/faith-in-flux3/ (chart at the top)
pewforum.org/2009/04/27/faith-in-flux4/ (chart at the top)
 
badnewsbarrett said:
There is a bit of a silver lining- it’s a decent silver lining for Protestants, not as big for Catholics. There are quite a few people who have left church behind, and many of them are even raising their kids without any churchgoing habits from the youngest possible age. However, when this happens, the rate of retention for the unaffiliated is not that good.

Among those who are raised unaffiliated, the rate of retention is less than 50%. Which is to say, only 46% of those raised unaffiliated are still unaffiliated as adults. Protestants and Catholics have much higher rates of retention- 68% of cradle Catholics are still Catholic, and 83% of cradle Catholics are some type of Christian who goes to church. 52% of those raised Protestant still belong to the specific type of Protestant church they were raised in, 80% are still some type of Protestant although much of that reflects a shift from Mainline to Evangelical, and exactly 83% of those raised Protestant are still some type of churchgoing Christian as an adult. An 83% churchgoing retention rate across the board is really quite good, especially compared to the 46% retention rate of those raised unaffiliated.

Now, with that being said, those raised Catholic and Protestant do wind up being unaffiliated with religion at rates of 14% and 13%, respectfully, and these rates are elevated significantly from where they’ve been in the past. But if this is to be what our future looks like, Protestants can look to some more comparative data that is fairly encouraging- 39% of those raised unaffiliated are now Protestant, and 22 of those percentage points go to Evangelicals, 13 to Mainline and 4 to historically black churches. Again, comparatively speaking and for the moment ignoring the relative size of the groups, I am very encouraged to see that 39% of those raised unaffiliated are becoming Protestants as adults. A loss rate of 13% is not quite what we want to see, but the percentage of those raised unaffiliated who become Protestant is three times greater. If these numbers hold up over time, the conversion numbers indicating who’s coming and going should be quite favorable as other factors stabilize a bit.

The relative percentages are not as good for Catholics, I’m afraid. The extent of your silver lining is a much higher rate of retention, 68% stay Catholic and 83% stay Christian whereas only 46% of those raised unaffiliated remain so. However, when you look at how many cradle Catholics become unaffiliated, that figure is 14%. By comparison, 6% of those raised unaffiliated are now Catholic. So basically, compared to cradle Catholics, those who are raised unaffiliated are not likely to be retained as such- but they also aren’t all that likely to become Catholic, those who do become affiliated tend to do so elsewhere, mostly as Protestants.

Sources. pewforum.org/2009/04/27/faith-in-flux2/ (chart at the bottom)
pewforum.org/2009/04/27/faith-in-flux3/ (chart at the top)
pewforum.org/2009/04/27/faith-in-flux4/ (chart at the top)
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Well, that would make sense considering the South is still predominately Protestant.
 
pianistclare said:
Well, depends on who you get data from.
I live in the South, and the churches are literally everywhere, and I have to say they’re popping. 🤷
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That’s because how the general population defines themselves, and church membership/participation, are two distinct sets of data. I think the 2nd one matters a great deal more than the first. I wouldn’t be surprised that in certain regions, church participation has increased since the 1980s while the number of identified Christians has decreased, and so what you can find is a less religious population with a greater number of active churches.

What the data is saying is that an increasing number of people that rarely/ever participate in public religious life are now identifying themselves as ‘none’ rather than as Christian. Christianity is losing people that it never had to begin with.
 
josie_L said:
Well, that would make sense considering the South is still predominately Protestant.
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The numbers reflect the tendencies of America as a whole. The South is becoming quite a bit more Catholic, though, as people from Catholic strongholds in the Northeast and Midwest have been moving to the south, including to some states that have never seen a Catholic population higher than 2%. Across the board, Catholic numbers have increased by 5-10% as a result of interstate movement. There’s a story about one parish in North Carolina where over 90% of its registered families came from somewhere outside the state.

ncregister.com/daily-news/protestant-south-becoming-a-new-catholic-stronghold/
the-american-catholic.com/2013/05/23/like-most-of-america-catholics-heading-south/
americancatholic.org/Messenger/May2007/Feature3.asp

With that being said, the southern increase in Catholicism across the board comes at the expense of the greater New York area, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, and cities like Chicago and Cleveland, where there are lots of stories about private schools being closed and churches being consolidated, sold, or shuttered. Things are evening out a bit, and in general, we’re no longer going to see states that are upwards of 40 or 50% Catholic, but we’re also not going to see states that are less than 5% Catholic.
 
badnewsbarrett said:
The numbers reflect the tendencies of America as a whole. The South is becoming quite a bit more Catholic, though, as people from Catholic strongholds in the Northeast and Midwest have been moving to the south, including to some states that have never seen a Catholic population higher than 2%. Across the board, Catholic numbers have increased by 5-10% as a result of interstate movement. There’s a story about one parish in North Carolina where over 90% of its registered families came from somewhere outside the state.

ncregister.com/daily-news/protestant-south-becoming-a-new-catholic-stronghold/
the-american-catholic.com/2013/05/23/like-most-of-america-catholics-heading-south/
americancatholic.org/Messenger/May2007/Feature3.asp

With that being said, the southern increase in Catholicism across the board comes at the expense of the greater New York area, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, and cities like Chicago and Cleveland, where there are lots of stories about private schools being closed and churches being consolidated, sold, or shuttered. Things are evening out a bit, and in general, we’re no longer going to see states that are upwards of 40 or 50% Catholic, but we’re also not going to see states that are less than 5% Catholic.
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That accurately portrays the Catholic population in South Carolina. My Parish is basically New York South.

As to Protestant migrations, many are being attracted to new non denominational mega churches. There are several near me with exploding memberships while the historic Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterians are loosing ground. Unfortunately, many of these mega churches grow preaching the Joel Osteen version of Christianity.
 
I think the greatest challenge to Christianity as a whole is the rise of the “nothings”. People with no religious affiliation that give no thought to a higher power whatsoever.

When Christians debate amongst themselves, the Holy Bible is kind of a baseline if you will; and everyone in the conversation believes in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. However, when engaging the unaffiliated “nothings” of the world, there is NO leg to stand on. To them; we believe in an invisible man who lives in the sky and we take our orders from a book of fairy-tales. They say “I don’t need to go to a building once a week with a bunch of people I don’t know. It’s a waste of an hour on Sunday morning. Besides… I’m a good person, and I don’t need anyone to tell me how to live.”

How does ANYONE reason with that? It’s very discouraging. This thinking is now THE prevailing school of thought in Western Civilization.
 
As others have pointed out this is just a formal acknowledgement of a reality. In some part it has to be due to a message that religious belief doesn’t matter. Not surprisingly indifferentism leads to lack of participation. I think the Church will actually be better off with less lukewarm and indifferent members.
Berridge of Cornelius said he believes there may be “something” out there in the universe and allows that Jesus “may have been a really awesome guy who said all that stuff.”
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I’m also concerned with the sloppy way by which people express their thoughts. Stuff? My uneducated grandparents could have expressed themselves with greater clarity and a broader vocabulary.
 
“I am spiritual, but not religious” is one of the great demonic lies of the 21st century.

In a few, it means “I perform all my religious duties privately.” That might mean worship, that might mean some re-orientation to the ethos of a higher power, but there is actual effort made towards submission and obedience to the power of good, in whatever form that is recognized. That is actually being religious, even if it doesn’t involve joining a public religious assembly.

In most, according to their own description, it means “I believe there is a reality other than the physical world, but as for “God,” I don’t interact with spiritual beings on a ‘duty’ basis. I meditate, but there is no one-up-one-down thing between us.” (i.e., they’re pantheists, even if they talk as if they are monotheists) or “I believe there is a God, but God leaves me alone because God isn’t a busybody like all you religious people who want to tell me to do things I don’t want to do or who want to forbid things that I do want to do.” (i.e., they’re individualists).
 
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